Psych 353: Social Cognition

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Psych 353 Social Cognition
Instructor Dr. Lisa Libby
TA Sonya Dal Cin
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Todays Plan

• What is Social Cognition?
• Social Psychology
• Cognitive Psychology
• Social Cognition
• definition
• some examples
• Course Overview
• Content
• Mechanics (i.e., course requirements, etc.)

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Behaviorism

• The scientific study of how rewards and
  punishment in the environment affect human and
  non-human behavior
• Empirical approach vary contingencies of reward
  and punishment and measure effect on behavior
• Try to explain all behavior without going inside
  the black box (the mind)

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Social Psychology

• The scientific study of the way in which peoples
  thoughts, feelings, and actions are influenced by
  the social environment.
• Empirical approach Vary aspects of social
  environment and see how this affects thoughts,
  feelings, or behavior, on average.
• Posit psychological explanations (i.e., processes
  that take place inside the mind) for observed
  effects

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Milgrams Obedience Studies
Original study 63 shocked innocent learner to
maximum level!
The ordinary person who shocked the victim did
so out of a sense of obligation -- an impression
of his duties as a subject -- and not from any
peculiarly aggressive tendencies. (Milgram,
1974)
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Bystander Non-intervention
Kitty Genovese 1964 38 witnesses and none helped
or called the police Why? diffusion of
responsibility audience inhibition pluralistic
ignorance
percent attempting to help
number of others
(Darley Latane, 1968)
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Cognitive Psychology

• The scientific study of basic mental
  abilities--e.g., perception, learning, memory,
  language, problem-solving Focus on
  information-processing use mind-as-computer
  analogy
• Empirical approach vary information input,
  measure performance output
• Posits psychological processes inside the mind
  that account for observed effects

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Cognitive PsychologyClassic examples

• Short-term memory 7 /- 2 (Miller, 1956)
• Stroop Effect (Stroop, 1935)

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purple orange green tan red green purple
grey orange pink black orange white yellow
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• Stroop Effect
• Result its easier to name ink color alone than
  in presence of conflicting color-name
• Conclusion we process the meaning of words
  automatically, without intention

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Cognitive PsychologyClassic examples

• Visual search (Treisman Souther, 1985)
• Find the Q

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Cognitive PsychologyClassic examples

• Visual search
• Result people find the Q among Os more
  quickly than the O among Qs
• Conclusion we are more efficient at representing
  the presence of a feature than the absence of a
  feature

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Social Psychology

Cognitive Psychology
Social Cognition!
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Social Cognition

• The scientific study of how people make sense of
  their social world How they perceive, represent,
  interpret, and remember information about
  themselves and about other individuals and groups
• Applies theories and methodologies from cognitive
  psychology (information processing approach) to
  classic social psychological questions

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Social CognitionExamples

• Phenomenon of interest Stereotyping
• Classic Social psychological approaches
• Competition Robbers cave experiment (Sherif et
  al., 1954/1961)
• Social Learning and Normative Influence e.g.,
  Pettigrews (1958) study of army recruits
• Social Cognitive approach focuses on
  information-processing, introducing new
  methodologies and new theories

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New methodologiesStroop and person-perception
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Results

• Result faster to read ink color when color and
  racial category label match than when they
  mismatch
• Conclusion racial categories come to mind
  automatically

reaction time (ms)
ink color
Karylowski, Motes, Curry, Van Liempd (2002)
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New theories

• An information-processing approach also suggests
  new ways of explaining classic social
  psychological phenomenon
• e.g., Treisman Souther bias towards noticing
  presence of features as opposed to absence
• Help to explain persistence of stereotypic
  beliefs?

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Course Content

• Part 1 Basics of how cognitive processes
  influence social judgment

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When youre hot, youre hot....or not?
Jason Allen came out on fire early. In pre-game
warmups, he took some extra time on 3 pointers
and he couldnt miss. He carried that hot hand
into the game.
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• What leads people to see the glass as half full
  vs. half empty? Is optimism or pessimism a
  better strategy?

Why do Ouija boards (seem to) work?
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Course Content

• Part 1 Basics of how cognitive processes
  influence social judgment
• Part 2 How a social cognitive perspective helps
  shed light on some of the BIG ISSUES

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THE SELF Why a desire to think well of yourself
may not be the only reason you think youre above
average
STEREOTYPING Why even YOU would show evidence of
stereotyping on Banajis Implicit Association Test
MORALITY Why do you believe its wrong to eat
your dog or sleep with your sibling?
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Course Content

• Part 1 Basics of how cognitive processes
  influence social judgment
• Part 2 How a social cognitive perspective helps
  shed light on some of the BIG ISSUES
• Part 3 Emerging perspectives in social cognition

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Social cognitive neuroscience Where in the brain
is the self?
Culture Tying cultural differences to cognitive
processes
Evolution Can the evolutionary past help to
explain present-day social cognition?
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Course Mechanics

• Readings
• Text Social Cognition by Ziva Kunda
• Reading packet at bookstore
• Lectures Lectures will contain new material, not
  in readings. You will be responsible for material
  from lectures as well as readings.

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Course MechanicsEvaluation and grading

• 3 Quizzes (10 each)
• 3 Discussion Sessions and related assignments
  (10 each)
• 1 Final paper (30)
• 1 portfolio of real-world examples (10)

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Course MechanicsThe unmentionables

• Late assignments Not accepted.
• Make-up Quizzes and discussion sessions There
  are none.
• Plagiarism Dont do it.

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Course MechanicsInformation

• Office Hours
• Tuesday 230 - 330, PAS 3052
• Wednesday 1000 - 1100, PAS 3252
• Course website
• http//www.arts.uwaterloo.ca/llibby/psych353/

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BEFORE YOU LEAVE, please hand in a piece of paper
with the following information 1. Your name 2.
Your year in university 3. Your major 4. Why are
you taking this course? 5. What do you hope to
get from this course?